Helicopter Parenting

Sabotages Success

HelicopterMA

Moving back in with parents after college
is not necessarily a bad thing. For some
young adults, crashing at mom and
dad’s for a specified period of time in
order to reach an explicit and attainable
goal can be just the launching pad they
need to propel themselves to the next level.

For others, the decision to move back into their parents’
home represents an effort to avoid a world where they must
depend on their self-reliance. They deny this to themselves
and perhaps others by spinning out unachievable fantasies
of what they will “someday” accomplish. For them, dreams
have become the tools of procrastination.

For some parents, the fear of no longer having the very
most important role in their child’s life makes them want
to stop the clock. They facilitate the
adult child’s return to the nest with
the expectation that their parental
role will not change, the selfreinforcing
conditions that turn
living at mom and dad’s home into
an unproductive codependency
that can be difficult to break down.

Content

This parent-child relationship
has its roots in early childhood
development. Such a pattern is referred to in popular
culture as helicopter parenting, or cosseting parenting.
More recently lawnmower parenting has been used to
describe parents who mow down coaches, other parents or
even other children in their desire to help their own child
succeed in youth sports and other venues.

This over attentiveness to a child’s needs and constant
hovering may feel intrusive to the child while growing up.
But by the time they are grown, they may have become
so accustomed to parental intrusiveness that they are
uncomfortable without it because they do not know how to
manage on their own.

What is a 'Helicopter' parent?

Overly intrusive parents take on far too much responsibility
for their child’s choices, behaviors, successes and defeats. They
work tirelessly to line things up in such a way that the child will
have a perfect life, free of heartache and rejection. When defeat
inevitably presents itself the parent subtly blames the child’s
self-initiative, however feeble it may
be. In this way the child is taught
not to experiment with self-directed
decisions and this fosters what
can be a crippling over-reliance on
parents.

Over-parenting translates into
parents acting as the frontal lobe
for the child—examples include
maneuvering to get the ‘right’
teacher, hovering over social interactions, directing play,
deciding when their children should pull the plug on a
social relationship or initiate a new one, overly checking
assignments and grades, controlling extracurricular activities. When trouble mounts, these parents often go in
one of two extreme directions—either by not bailing out the
child in any degree (abrupt parental withdrawal of affection
creates so much anxiety that the child silently vows to never
again go against parental wishes) or by bailing out to the
point that the child experiences no consequences at all.

Why is this phenomenon even more prevalent now?

Helicopter parenting is more prevalent now than ever
before in history. Parents are encouraged to get involved on
a micro-level in the lives of their
children. For some this becomes an
obsession that starts in preschool.
Parents may become in-class
volunteers, coach the games, set
up playdates and ensure children
are fully prepared for kindergarten
by doing extra schoolwork outside
of school. At the other end of
the education process, graduate
school admission departments and
law schools report larger than ever turnouts of parents to
orientation and admission events.

By late elementary/middle school, many children have
cell phones and readily utilize social media. This added
technology means parents can be in touch with their offspring
on a moment-to-moment basis. For gain or loss—parents
today know a great deal more about their children’s private
social worlds than they did 10 years ago. With few boundaries
in place, parents feel liberated as they comment, criticize and
offer suggestions. This unsolicited counsel robs children of
the chance to grow through their relationships by learning
for themselves who they can trust,
who they like and how to learn
to communicate their feelings to
people when they are let down. They
also learn a little about the social
consequences of letting one or more
of their peers down.

Parents who are always the
child’s go-to person have a hard time
letting go so that their children may
experience life more directly.

Some parents start this pattern early, overly playing
with their children and not allowing the child any quiet
alone time. These parents have difficulty letting their kids
struggle even for a small amount of time. The result of
this overbearing approach is the child has a diminished
internal/private world. Having a deep and rich internal
world is what drives motivation, initiative and creativity.
Those parents who intervene too much thwart this natural
inherent drive.

As children reach high school, some parents go overboard
trying to make up for the failure of not being involved with
their children when they were younger. Just when a young
person needs to be making more of their
own decisions/mistakes, the parent sweeps
in and takes away this opportunity. Other
times, hovering is a way for parents to avoid
confronting the fact that their stage of life
is changing, their nest is emptying and
they are going to have to make adjustments in their own lives.
Micromanaging their grown child’s life is a way to perpetuate
parenthood and, in a fashion, a method to freeze time.

When parents try to work out their own longings and
needs through their children, it means the child is not able
to achieve whatever developmental milestone is on the
table for the particular stage of life they are experiencing.
This often creates for a child a kind of dulling dependency
and failure to flourish.

What are the consequences?

After all of that intervention, intrusiveness, questioning and
working, the day comes when some parents do feel like… “Okay
we got him out of college, now he will be on his own,” and truly
do want to let go at this time. What they discover is that without
the reminding and encouraging of the perennial, parental alarm
clock, their adult child has no idea how to proceed.

Adult children of helicopter parents have experienced
so much cushioning that they have never made their own
mistakes and, most importantly, have not learned to rebound
from failure. As a result, they struggle with self-sufficiency
and with learning how to talk themselves through setbacks.
They tend to give up easily, dabble in their pursuits; and
have difficulty developing depth in their relationships and
professional pursuits.

How to parent without taking over?

Do you tend to take challenges away from your child?
This can be done through gratuitous problem solving—for
instance, carefully maneuvering the events, teachers and
friends in your child’s life so that things are easier for him
or her. Instead, focus on the long-term picture, not the
short term bailout. Even if it is hard for you to not take
over, remind yourself parenting is a marathon not a sprint. If they learn to deal with setbacks at an early age, they will
be prepared for how hard real life becomes later.

Is what you are doing really for their well-being or
for yours? Be very honest with yourself and notice if you
are unintentionally encouraging your child to be overly
dependent upon you. Perhaps this is helping you to not
confront the reality of your own mortality or changing life
role. Instead of using your child to fill a void, start working on
building up your own professional, social or volunteer pursuits.

Can you engage your child in a conversation? Each time
you find yourself problem solving for your child, pause and
ask him or her how they want to handle the situation. You
can offer suggestions, but make space
for them to think through the situation
too. Engage in a back and forth dialogue,
supporting them by telling them you
believe in them and know they will find
a way to manage whatever is upsetting
them. Remember: If you do not let them work through
their setbacks, you are depriving them of the opportunity
to see what they are capable of.

Do you have difficulty watching your child struggle?
Most parents do. Some manage this discomfort by taking
over the tasks entirely. Instead, offer coaching. Coaching is
talking things through, offering emotional encouragement,
but not taking on a challenge or problem solving for them.
Remember your mission as a parent is to teach coping
skills—not merely to provide happy experiences. Remind
your child that rejection and disappointments are hard but
these feelings do pass and one can always try again. Teach
them how to distract themselves with other pursuits.

What is the personality of your child? It is important
to consider what you child is like. Some are extremely
self-disciplined, motivated and driven. If this sounds like
yours, sure it is okay to step in occasionally and even to
offer to help in specific ways. If your child has a harder time
being a self-starter, help them tap into their motivation by
talking things through, asking the important questions, but
resist doing for them. Some kids simply need someone to
unconditionally listen; this can be a great gift from a parent.
A gift that has the power to unlock the door to self discovery.

Helicopter parents can adjust and change at any stage
of the child rearing process. The mind is flexible and when
exposed to new experiences can learn. That is true for
parents and their children. Engage your child differently,
do less of what should be their work. The reward is a child
who will become more autonomous and goal-driven.

Jill Weber, a licensed clinical psychologist, practices in the Washington, DC
area. She writes a blog for www.psychologytoday.com and is the author of
Having Sex, Wanting Intimacy: Why Women Settle for One-Sided Relationships.
Follow her on Twitter @DrJillWeber

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